Nicola Lisle talks to Kah-Ming Ng, director of early music ensemble Charivari Agréable, about their summer season

Music by candlelight sounds more fitting for Christmas than summer, but baroque group Charivari Agréable — which translates as ‘pleasant tumult’ — has made its season of candlelit concerts in Exeter College Chapel a popular fixture on Oxford’s summer calendar.

“If I don’t put the programme out on the website by about mid-May, I get frantic emails!” chuckles Kah-Ming Ng, who founded Charivari Agréable in 1993 while studying at Oxford (he gained both his Masters and doctorate here).

The summer festival stretches over five weeks and features several themed concerts, all of which make at least two or three appearances. This year’s event coincides with the launch of Charivari Agréable’s latest CD, Avanti L’Opera, a collection of opera overtures by Italian composers of the baroque era, including Albinoni, Scarlatti and many lesser-known contemporaries.

“This is disc number 22, hot off the press!” Kah-Ming tells me proudly. “Bizarrely, no one’s done a disc of baroque overtures. They’ve done all the Handel overtures and Vivaldi overtures, but what about all the other Italian masters of the 17th and 18th centuries?

“Obviously, putting on a whole opera is costly, but I have just extricated the overtures, because they were originally stand-alone pieces, interchangeable as well, and bore very little relation to the opera that they introduced.

“They had to write something that was immediately appealing. People were chatting amongst themselves before the opera started and even into the performance itself, so the opera overtures had to compete, because everyone was struggling to be seen and heard. It was a strange state of affairs!”

As with previous CDs, Avanti L’Opera reflects Charivari’s ethos of unearthing little-known material, and presenting it as authentically as possible using period instruments and playing techniques. “We’re one of the few early music ensembles that still do source research,” says Kah-Ming. “That means keeping my ears to the ground with regards to where material can be found, who’s writing what dissertation, and so on. Every disc we’ve done so far has followed those precepts, either saying or finding something new.”

As well as launching the new CD, this season is marking the tercenten-ary of the Hanoverian accession with concerts featuring Handel’s Chandos anthems and Concerto Grosso 2 for oboe and strings.

There is also the intriguingly-titled Ravish’d by Magic, which explores magic, necromancy and superstition in the Elizabethan age, with music, anec-dotes and readings from Shakespeare.

Another highlight is Kah-Ming’s solo harpsichord programme, telling the story of Buxtehude and his efforts to find a husband for his daughter shortly before his retirement from the position of organist in the German city of Lübeck.

“It’s a good story, and there’s some very good music as well,” Kah-Ming says. “It tells how Bach, Handel and Mattheson went to Lübeck to learn from the old master but also to audition for his position, only to find there was a marriage condition atta-ched. So they all politely declined!”

In contrast is A Heavenly Concord, which Kah-Ming describes as “the concert to melt people’s hearts”. The programme features arias, cantata and motet for alto (Roderick Morris), oboe d’amore (Leo Duarte) and string orchestra. It all adds up to a very pleasant tumult indeed.

Early Music by Candlelight Summer Festival 2014
Exeter College Chapel
Until August 17
Tickets: Call 01865 305305 or visit ticketsoxford.com